Toby Sibbick sealed Hibs’ Scottish Cup exit last month with a deft dinked finish to help ease Hearts into the fifth round.
And the defender has revealed how he instantly shut down transfer interest from across the capital before he returned to Tynecastle for a second spell. Sibbick was out of the picture at Barnsley in late 2021 and the Tykes were willing to let him leave if he could find himself a new club.
The Hibees contacted Sibbick’s agent, who was skeptical of their chances of success given his client’s previous stint across the city. Despite playing only two games for the Jambos before being floored by illness and his future far from certain, Sibbick knew he just couldn’t cross the divide. In the end, he did return to Edinburgh as Hearts swooped to snap him up on a three-and-a-half year deal. “About the November time, after the Fulham game, we appointed the new manager and I only trained twice with him,” Sibbick explained. “He said I wasn’t going to be playing or part of his plans and I could start looking elsewhere.
“As a player, from November to January is a long time and there’s a lot of football to be played, so he ruled me out pretty early. In the December, Barnsley said to me that If I found a club, I could go and wouldn't have to wait until January.
“I was thinking: ‘This can’t be normal, something else must be going on,’ because Barsnley is more of a selling club and the board has a lot of influence on how things are run. There were a few loan options, some in League One which were good loans, but I felt after how I was getting treated, I needed to get out permanently.
“Hibs came about. They got in touch with my agent, but he said straight away: ‘Right, I’ll take it to him but I can’t promise you anything because that’s a bit of a crazy move if he does that.’
“He spoke to me but I was like ‘nah, I can’t do that.’ Even though it was only two games and I missed the derby through illness, just watching it you could feel the passion between both sets of fans and clubs, so I couldn’t go there.
“It was a waiting game then the Hearts interest came about. I said: ‘Yeah, let’s do it.’”
Now established after a rocky start back across the border, Sibbick let slip that one of this season's new boys wowed Robbie Neilson’s squad with one of the best initiation song performances ever heard. “I tell you what, Humps (Stephen Humphrys) has got a voice on him,” Sibbick told the Scarves Around the Funnel podcast. “He sang Lewis Capaldi and he was top drawer. All the boys gave him a standing ovation.
“When we went on our little tour after the World Cup break, we went to a bar to watch the England game. I think it was Senegal they were playing and at half-time, we made him sing again. The whole bar was buzzing from it! He’s quality.
“To be fair, around the changing room at training or on matchdays, songs go through your head and you let a few lyrics out. So you could always hear he’s got a bit. When he stood up, it could either be dreadful or unbelievable and I think it’s the best one I’ve heard so far.”
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